Parenting: a dynamic perspective (George W. Holden,
third edition)
Week 1:
Chapter 2: Theoretical perspectives on parenting
Lay theories Folk beliefs that have not been empirically verified. Informal and
unscientific theories reflecting conventional wisdom. Sometimes
called ethnotheories. They include beliefs about what children are
like, when they attain particular skills, how children change and the
ways in which parents influence development.
Psychosexual theory (Freud)= children’s development progressed in a fixed and orderly sequence
through discrete stages:
1. Oral
2. Anal
3. Phallic
4. Latency
5. Genital
Galinsky (1981)= theory of parenting comprised of 6 orderly stages that are tied to age of the child.
1. Image-making= preparing for parenthood
2. Nurturing (birth to 2 years)
3. Authority (2-5 years)
4. Interpretive/helping the child understand the world (5-12 years)
5. Interdependent= parents nee dot develop anew their relationships 9adolescence)
6. Departure (late adolescence)
Ontogenetic Development of individuals over their lifespan.
Phylogenetic Development of the species over time.
Classical theories: attachment theory and behavioral theory.
Attachment theory A theory about development that focuses on the establishment,
maintenance and consequences off affectionate bonds between
parents and children.
Focus of attachment theory is to understand how love between a parent and child develops and
affects development. The theory has roots in Freudian ideas, evolutionary vies and the research of
Harry Harlow into mother-child rhesus monkeys= monkeys sought comfort of the terry-cloth covered
monkey, not the one with the feeding tube. He concluded it was the warmth rather than the
nourishment that the infants sought.
Core premise of attachment theory is that the relationship between a parent and infant reflects a
behavioral system that adapted to promote survival and competent functioning of the offspring. The
behavioral system has two central parts;
1. Novelty seeking= children will seek new activities and experiences when they feel safe in
their environment. Through this behavioral system, children acquire new competences.
2. Proximity seeking= when children feel threatened/scared, they will retreat to being held by
or being near the parent in an effort to regain feelings of being safe.
,Caregivers establish their role as secure base over the first year of life by showing warmth and love to
the infants, being sensitive to their cues, by satisfying their needs and helping to regulate their
emotions. In turn, infants learn to trust that the caregiver will take care of their needs.
Research into attachment styles strange situation procedure.
Secure attachment Infants are upset when mothers leave and upon their return
they approach and hug them.
Anxious-avoidant attachment Avoiding/ignoring the parent when he/she returns from a
separation. Develops when parents doe not attend regularly to
the infant’s needs.
Anxious-resistant attachment Upset when the mother leaves and resistant when she returns.
Infant learns that the parent is an unreliable caregiver.
Disorganized attachment Does not follow a pattern, but shows a mixture of responses.
Often develops after abuse or trauma.
The way a child responds to the maternal absence is due to the history of parent-child interaction.
Infants who received sensitive parenting over their first year of life developed a secure attachment.
Parents who fail to respond sensitively are likely to have children who develop insecure attachment
relations.
Interpersonal acceptance- Parental love results in positive outcomes. Rejection negatively
rejection theory (IPARTheory) affects a child’s psychological adjustment and behavioral
functioning.
Behavioral theory= Watson espoused an extreme environmental and mechanistic perspective.
- Classical conditioning= involved learning a new behavior through the process of
association two stimuli are linked together to produce a new learned response.
- Operant conditioning (Skinner)= actions that enhance the likelihood that a behavior will
recur (reinforcements) and actions that result in behavior being less likely to reappear
(punishments).
Positive reinforcement= addition of a stimuli increases the behavior
Negative reinforcement= an unpleasant stimulus/event is removed
Positive punishment= aversive stimuli is applied in response to an undesired behavior
Negative punishment= something enjoyable is removed
According to behavior theorist, parents often make at least 3 basic operant conditioning mistakes;
1. They give attention to undesired behaviors, therefore reinforcing them
2. Parents fail to positively reinforce desired behaviors
3. They overly rely on punishments rather than reinforcements
Fundamental problems with punishments;
- They generally are ineffective because parents do not punish correctly. Punishments are only
effective if they are used consistently (any time the misbehavior occur), contingently (right
after the misbehavior) and firmly and decisively.
- Punishments introduce fear and anxiety into the parent-child relationship and thus does not
promote positive interactions.
Evolutionary developmental psychology= understand human behavior and characteristics as a result
of adaptive processes over tens of thousand of years.
- Evolution= theory about the origins of plants and animals as well as processes of change
, - Natural selection= process whereby heritable traits that are better suited for an environment
will survive and other traits will become less common
- Love served to ensure cohesive family relationships and paternal involvement in child
rearing, thus increasing the likelihood of child survival.
- Parental investment= the time, energy and resources parents devote to rearing their
children.
The amount of shared genetic material, the offspring’s likelihood of survival and the
future likelihood that the child will have children influences the parental investment.
Cultural, social and environmental factors may also contribute to use of parental
investment.
Differential parental investment offers one explanation of why some parents physically
abuse their children.
- Females value good genes, good provides and good fathers with regard to mate selection.
Males value physical features indicating fertility, women who will be faithful, good provides
and good mothers.
Behavioral genetics theory= seeks to understand genetic and environmental contributions to
variations in human behavior and characteristics.
- Focuses on genetic inheritance and environmental contributions to behavior or particular
characteristics. Goal is to understand both genetic and environmental influences on human
behavior.
Nativist= view that espouses that children’s genetic makeup or innate characteristics are they key
determinants of development rather than the environment.
Twin studies Similarities in children’s characteristics i=within a family are
compared in identical, fraternal and non-twin siblings.
Adoption studies Used to compare the similarities between adopted and biological
offspring with their biological and adoptive parents.
Genotype An individual’s genetic makeup.
Phenotype The physical expression or manifestation of an individual’s genotype.
Epigenetics Study of how phenotypic expression is affected by prior experience.
Shared environment Aspects of the environment (activities, social interactions,
friendships) experienced by two or more siblings in the same family.
Nonshared environment Aspects of the environments that are unique to each child in a
family.
Behavioral geneticists identify 3 basic ways that children’s genetic makeup influences their
development gene-environment interaction= a particular phenotypic expression is due to the
interaction between genes and the environment.
1. Passive role of genes in the environment. Child’s parents, due to their own genetic makeup,
create an environment that is independent of the influence of the child’s genotype.
2. Active role of genes in directing a child to seek out certain environments. An extroverted
child will frequently seek out other children to play with.
3. Evocative role of genes. Parents react to a child’s phenotype in a particular way unique to
that child.
Group socialization theory= highlights the role that peers and peer-group processes play, particularly
during adolescence.
, Ecological systems theory (Urie Bronfenbrenner)= focuses on the
interrelations of different levels of context and how they relate to
child’s behavior and development.
- Capture how the developing child is embedded in a series of
environmental systems or context that interact with one
another and with the child. Ecologists believe that one cannot
and should not separate out the person from the
environment; the two are integrally connected.
- Transactional influence= there is a continuous mutual
influence of the person and environment on development. In
turn, individuals change and then influence the environment
around them.
The levels of context in Bronfenbenner’s theory are hierarchically
organized and nested, each within the next:
Microsystem Innermost environmental context. Refers to the immediate settings that
a person encounters and the interactions and activities within those
settings (interactions at home, classroom).
Mesosystem Second level of the model. The connections/interrelations between
microsystems. Children’s development is promoted when there are
supportive links between microsystems. (links between home, centers,
school).
Exosystem Third level of the model. Contexts that do not ordinarily contain children
but nevertheless affect their development (parent’s place of
employment).
Macrosystem Final/outermost level of the model. Subcultural/cultural context in which
microsystems, mesosystems and exosystems are embedded (cultural
values, laws). What happens at this level affects each of the inner levels.
Chronosystem Past experiences that influence present behavior. How nested systems of
interactions influence future behavior and change as the child gets older.
Ecological systems theory has been influential in at least two ways;
1. It helped to focus attention on the role that context plays in the lives of children and their
parents
2. It has afforded a theoretical structure within which to integrate diverse research results
Social cognitive theory= focuses on the cognitive and information-
processing capacities of individuals as central influences on their social
behavior. Addresses how social behavior is modified through social
experiences.
- Coercive cycle= problematic interactions in which two
individuals compete with increasing force to see who can gain
control. It is a bad idea for parents to engage in these cycles
because (1) it is unlikely that the parent will win without
engaging in very punitive/abusive behavior, (2) the cycle
undermines the parent’s authority and power.
Control theory= theory of parent-child relationships that focuses on
how both parents and children perceive and respond to the intensity,
